All this time, I was busily working, unreeving the port buntline. I took the end, made a running bowline with it round the gasket, and let the loop slide down over the boy's head and shoulders. Then I took a strain on it and tightened it under his arms. A minute later we had him safely on the yard between us. In the uncertain moonlight, I could just make out the mark of a great lump on his forehead, where the foot of the sail must have caught him when it knocked him over. As we stood there a moment, taking our breath, I caught the sound of the Second Mate's voice close beneath us. Williams glanced down; then he looked up at me and gave a short, grunting laugh. "Crikey!" he said. "What's up?" I asked, quickly. He jerked his head backwards and downwards. I screwed round a bit, holding the jackstay with one hand, and steadying the insensible Ordinary with the other. In this way I could look below. At first, I could see nothing. Then the Second Mate's voice came up to me again. "Who the hell are you? What are you doing?" I saw him now. He was standing at the foot of the weather t'gallant rigging, his face was turned upwards, peering round the after side of the mast. It showed to me only as a blurred, pale-coloured oval in the moonlight. He repeated his question. "It's Williams and I, Sir," I said. "Tom, here, has had an accident." I stopped. He began to come up higher towards us. From the rigging to leeward there came suddenly a buzz of men talking. The Second Mate reached us. "Well, what's up, anyway?" he inquired, suspiciously. "What's happened?" He had bent forward, and was peering at Tom. I started to explain; but he cut me short with: "Is he dead?" "No, Sir," I said. "I don't think so; but the poor beggar's had a bad fall. He was hanging by the gasket when we got to him. The sail knocked him off the yard." "What?" he said, sharply. "The wind caught the sail, and it lashed back over the yard--" "What wind?" he interrupted. "There's no wind, scarcely." He shifted his weight on to the other foot. "What do you mean?" "I mean what I say, Sir. The wind brought the foot of the sail over the top of the yard and knocked Tom clean off the foot-rope. Williams and I both saw it happen." "But there's no wind to do such a thing; you're talking nonsense!" It seemed to me that there was as much of bewilderment as anything else in his voice; yet I could tell that he was suspicious--though, of what, I doubted whether he himself could have told. He glanced at Williams, and seemed about to say something. Then, seeming to change his mind, he turned, and sung out to one of the men who had followed him aloft, to go down and pass out a coil of new, three-inch manilla, and a tailblock. "Smartly now!" he concluded. "i, i, Sir," said the man, and went down swiftly. The Second Mate turned to me. "When you've got Tom below, I shall want a better explanation of all this, than the one you've given me. It won't wash."